TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Trip report part deux

Hi all,
Second day finds up embarking on a trip to SBH. We booked our ferry the day before via the online voyager website for $75 pp. We arrived at Marigot ferry port at 830 Monday morning and happy we did because parking was troublesome. The boys let us out in front in we got in line. We were next up when the boys showed up and I showed the desk clerk our email confirmation. It was 845 and the ferry departed at 850. Close call. We took the advice of taking nondrowsy dramamine ..although the ride was windy but not too rough. Also, they serve fresh juices free on board. We arrived in SBH an hour later to be greeted by Arnaud WH TopLoc car rentals. No probs this time around as we went to airport to retrieve our cute mini cooper convertible. We had enough trunk space for our cooler and beach bag and enough space for the four of us.
Off we went. Made a stop at the airport to get snack and Carib beer for the cooler watch a Winair flight land ...very cool...I might add..and then stopped for photo op above the airport. You have to do it, right?
Then we drove into St. Jean. We ended up at Nikki Beach, kind of accidently, but all good bc La Plage was closed as was Tom's. We practically had the beach to ourselves and it was pure heaven. The water was the perfect aqua blue. Calm and inviting. We swam and drank and just enjoyed the beauty there. Then we tried to find lunch but really nothing handy in SJ so we went back to Gustavia. Tried to find shell beach to eat there, but couldn't....the restaurants were closed there too. So, we fount Bar D L' Loubli where we had excellent Paninis. Mine was goat cheese. Our friends had ham and cheese and a mozzarella. Also had iced tea which was served in a very unique set up. Ice in a glass container below with the hot tea on top. You let it steep for a few minutes then poured over the Iced section. Tea Forte is the comany That makes and I want!
Next was on to Grand Fond and that side of the island. We drove to Saline but the gate, actually two, were closed and locked. So we went to Fort Carl for a panorama view (here is where we saw shell beach and the empty barred restaurants). Not too strenuous of a hike to top at the Fort which rewarded us with great scenery of town and marina and sea.
Onward, we ended I back in Gustavia to do some shopping. My hubby purchased me a very unusual double wrapped bracelet at Le Pasha made by the designer Ursula out of Paris. Love!
We also got the obligatory t shirts, w the airplane logo and magnet.
By that time, it was almost the end of the day so we took the car back to the airport and got the ride back to the ferry. I really would like to explore Saint Barts more because the enjoyed the time we did have on the island! Beautiful island, beautiful people. Hey, i think i just found their new slogan! Lol. Oh....almost forgot and as a side note, the Mini Cooper pulled all the hills just fine!
That night, since we got in kind of late and had to.clean up from the beach time. We went to the greenhouse cand got their grilled lobster special which came with carribean style peas and rice .... was very delicious. Got to love spiny lobster! A plus when visiting here. The drinks exceptionally good too. Fresh fruit coladas of all kinds.As an appetizer we had their escargot! Always have to get escargot when we go to a French island!
I'll post pics later as I'm on phone doing this report. Lol. And I want to make sure they are Un petit this go around.

!!Here are the pics to go with report. Enjoy !! I tried to put in order but first is Nikki Beach. The rest are kind of explanatory, but feel free to quiz me. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Clapping.gif" alt="" />


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Hi. The pictures are beautiful, but you really need to shrink them from side to side, as they mess with everyone's computer monitor. Please send an email to Eric at admin@traveltalkonline.com to have him help you do that.

Carol, These fit my screen. I don't know what kind of computer you are using that are showing them big? I have an acer aspire laptop. I reduced the size/width and heighth and also went to photobucket and uploaded them there.

I have a widescreen monitor also, but if you look at the comments to your earlier pictures, you will see MANY comments of people that had problems with the width of the pictures. The width of these is the same as the others, I think.

Ok. But, I went back and looked on my phone at the others and can see that they were a little wide, but not overly so. These are not. I looked at my phone and logged out and went back in to my computer to make sure. I saw the others comments. Maybe it is the percentage that the screen is set on??? Mine is on 100%. Thanks, Carol.

Great pics, makes me want to add a St Barts trip to our next visit
Pics fit my laptop screen

Thanks for taking the time to post pics
J&B

Really nice photos. Had no problem with viewing. Thank you for posting.

Nice pics
Will go someday based on them after I get to Saba. Been going to SXM for 30+ years and just stay put after landing.
They showed up fine on my MacBook Pro laptop.

Note to DrDoug,

As lovely as St. Bart's is, and it truly is lovely, if you can manage to tear yourself away from the beach for a whole day, Saba is gorgeous and more than worth the effort and expense involved in getting there. It took us every bit of twenty plus years worth of trips to get there the first time but once there, we knew we'd be back again and we totally enjoyed our three night stay there when we finally did it. But it's a totally chill place and three nights was definitely enough for us.

And I'll admit, we also did StB three or four trips worth but each time was to show it to different friends visiting with us as first timers. And truth be known, because I really did love the old cat trips back in the day before the high speed ferries started doing trips, but it doesn't hold half the draw of Saba. At least, not for us! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />

I agree, Saba is lovely. We visited there on first trip to dive and ended up staying the night because of Tropical Storm Jean. We wanted to try a different island this time. I'd go again. The diving is superb on Saba and the island is truly an unspoiled queen!

They fit my laptop perfectly. Keep it up.

They are HUGE but very beautiful!

You've done Saba and St. Barts so of course you know, now you have to do Anguilla - so very close to St. Martin and yet so totally different from it or any of the other islands mentioned so far.

And while they came through huge on both my ipad and pc, your photos are gorgeous - each and every one of them. Thank you so much for sharing the trip - it helps lessen the pain of waiting! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />

Thank you. And will have to try Anguilla next time. We did anchor off Cap Jaluca and visited Prickly Pear on the last trip.

Bar d'Oubli = Oblivion Bar. Hubbies spent a few oblivious hours there as girlfriend & I shopped. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/jester.gif" alt="" />

Great pictures, but they are too wide for my screen too.

Thanks. I love taking photos.Especially of beautiful scenery. , Sorry about wide screen. Just curious as to what everyone is looking at the pictures on? What type of computer, pad or laptop?

The person viewing the photos just needs to hit ctrl and the minus key-this will downsize the photo to fit their screen. And if the photos or text is to small hit ctrl and plus. The photos are great and fit my screen perfectly. Enjoy!